Brazil's President Has Canceled A Trip To Meet With Obama Because Of NSA Spying Revelations

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff has postponed a
planned trip to the United States in October over revelations
that the National Security Agency spied on her
personal communications and those of other
Brazilians.

The White House confirmed the postponement in a statement
from Press Secretary Jay Carney on Tuesday. Carney signaled that
after a review of policy, a meeting at a later date is
possible.

"As the President previously stated, he has directed a
broad review of U.S. intelligence posture, but the process will
take several months to complete," Carney said.

"President Obama and President Rousseff both look forward
to the State Visit, which will celebrate our broad relationship
and should not be overshadowed by a single bilateral issue, no
matter how important or challenging the issue may be. For this
reason, the presidents have agreed to postpone President
Rousseff’s State Visit to Washington scheduled
for October 23.

"President Obama looks forward to welcoming President
Rousseff to Washington at a date to be mutually
agreed."

The postponement came after Obama made a last-minute phone
call to Rousseff on Monday night. It also came amid outrage in
Brazil after Guardian journalist Glenn Greenwald reported
on the NSA's operations in Brazil, based on documents from NSA
leak source Edward Snowden. The documents revealed that the NSA
had spied on Rousseff and Mexican President Enrique
Peña Nieto.

Brazil, for example, operates its own massive domestic spying
operation — a detail Greenwald, who lives in Rio de Janeiro,
leaves out of all of his outraged writing about the NSA. In 2008,
ABIN, Brazil’s intelligence agency, secretly
recorded a conversation between Supreme Court president
Gilmar Mendes and Sen. Demóstenes Torres. The president at the
time, Lula da Silva, suspended the agency’s chief spy, but no one
knows how long or how often senior officials were wiretapped.
[...]

Earlier this year, ABIN was accused of spying on a movement to oppose the
construction of the Belo Monto Dam in Northern Brazil. That
wasn’t a unique incident, either: in June Brazil’s intel service
launched a massive effort to surveil and eavesdrop on social media — a reaction to this
year’s mass protests that Brazilian police violently beat down.

Pres. Rousseff did not like being surprised by social unrest, so
she ordered the monitoring — yet she seems offended the U.S.
would monitor her to avoid surprises.